[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 95 (Tuesday, July 8, 1997)]
[House]
[Pages H4894-H4895]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




              AMERICA NEEDS REAL WELFARE-TO-WORK PROGRAMS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentlewoman from Texas [Ms. Jackson-Lee] is recognized for 5 minutes.
  (Ms. JACKSON-LEE asked and was given permission to revise and extend 
her remarks.)
  Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Mr. Speaker, I think that what is expected of those 
of us who are honored by service in the U.S. Congress is simply telling 
the truth.
  Let me start by telling the truth about the team who have guided the 
Sojourner. Let me congratulate them for not only their initiative but 
their talent, their creativity, and for raising up science as not only 
an art and a study but the work of the 21st century.
  Might I add my congratulations, as a Member of the House Committee on 
Science, for the outstanding work that has been done out in California 
on behalf of this country and of the world. We should never shy away 
from knowledge.
  Now I think it is equally important to address this whole question of 
taxation, the deficit, and, yes, welfare reform. Interestingly enough, 
as my Republican colleagues keep focusing on the deficit, the deficit, 
the deficit, let me remind them that the revenue flow in June, 
according to the Wall Street Journal, reflecting a continued healthy 
economy, could signal a deficit of $50 billion or less for fiscal year 
1997. Hear me clearly, $50 billion, less than a third of the original 
Government forecast, and a fifth of the peak $290.4 billion deficit in 
1992.
  After the budget passed in 1993, on the clock of the Clinton 
Administration, that is why we now have only a $50 billion deficit. 
That needs to be made clear. Policies of a Democratic administration 
brought this deficit down.
  What we have now, however, are all of the individuals who keep 
hollering about a so-called deficit now trying to cut those who are in 
need, particularly those who are moving from welfare to work.
  Interestingly enough, as I went to an inner city district, my own, 
and asked those individuals on welfare and those who are the working 
poor, all of us agreed collectively that welfare is not the way to go, 
that there needed to be reform. We opened our hearts and our minds to 
the issue of welfare reform. But let me cite for my colleagues the 
inequities of the Republican workfare or welfare reform.

  Geneva Moore, a 45-year-old in New York. She indicates that she is 
happy to work the 20 hours a week as she cleans up a dusty and dirty 
back lot of the housing project, but she has a little dignity. And the 
question becomes, as she cleans her shabby back lot of the Murphy 
consolidated public housing, is how she gets treated and what kind of 
training she gets.
  Well, my colleagues, she is learning to sweep a lot. Are there a lot 
of jobs

[[Page H4895]]

for those who sweep a lot? I beg to ask the question, and say no. First 
of all, there is a question of minimum wage. I am glad the Democrats 
have convinced Republicans that those who work on welfare deserve the 
minimum wage. But you know what she does not get, Mrs. Moore, who has 
three children? She does not get the opportunity to ask for a brace for 
her back when she is lifting heavy trash cans, or boots and heavy 
gloves to protect her feet and hands from broken glass, crack vials, 
and junkies' needles.
  Can she talk to a union organizer? Of course not. Can she get the 
dignity of a paycheck? Can she translate the sweeping of the shabby lot 
into a real job, which most Americans think workfare will bring about?
  Moore and many others say that as long as she is doing work other 
people are hired and paid to do, she should not need to wait to be 
treated like a worker with the kind of benefits and kind of health care 
that she needs. She says clearly that these city maintenance workers, 
in particular in New York, they make $9 an hour. And while she does 
not, she says some of those workers drink coffee and remind her that 
she pays for their welfare check, creating a two-tiered, second-class 
citizenship when these so-called workfare individuals work alongside of 
the regular workers.
  What about Hattie Hargrove, who used to work? She used to work and 
get benefits, but yet she was laid off by the parks department of New 
York. She had to go on welfare because she could find no job. And what 
is she doing in workfare now? Working in the city parks department with 
no benefits, alongside of those individuals who themselves will be 
downsized and soon to be unemployed?
  We need to fix the welfare-to-work system. First of all, we need to 
recognize that we need the kind of jobs that will create opportunity 
for people to move from welfare to work, jobs that they can be hired 
for. We also have to recognize that we should not disadvantage low-
income workers by attritioning them out and then putting in the work 
force people with no benefits, no ability to organize, no ability to 
understand and to be able to be protected against sexual harassment and 
discrimination. We are not giving dignity to these individuals who want 
to work, who want to be trained.
  The other question is, if we truly want welfare-to-work, we need more 
child care, we need more moneys for transportation. And lastly, Mr. 
Speaker, let me say that the way to reform welfare is not to give big 
corporations the ability to run welfare like some States want to do, 
giving large corporations like Lockheed and others the ability to work 
welfare. And, lastly, we need to make sure that we give them the right 
kind of training, Mr. Speaker, in order to ensure that they get the 
right kind of jobs. Let us have real training and real welfare-to-work.

                          ____________________